Light Bread
2 quarts of flour. 1 teaspoonful of sugar. 1 teaspoonful of salt. Half a teacup of yeast. One egg, well beaten. 1 pint of water. Sift the flour and divide it into three parts. Mix one third in the batter, one third in the jar to rise in, and pour the other third over the batter. Let it stand two hours and then work it well, adding a small piece of lard before baking.--Mrs. Dr. S.
RECIPE FOR HOT ROLLS OR COLD LOAF BREAD.
Mix the following ingredients.
Four pints of flour. 1 pint of fresh milk. 2 eggs, well beaten. 1 large tablespoonful of melted lard. 1 large tablespoonful of hop yeast. Set it to rise at eleven o'clock in the morning, for early tea. Make into rolls at five o'clock P. M., and bake as soon as risen. In cool weather, set before the fire, both before and after making it into rolls.--Mrs. S. FRENCH ROLLS. 1 quart of flour. 1 teaspoonful of salt. 2 eggs. 1 large tablespoonful of lard. 2 tablespoonfuls of yeast.
Work and knead it well at night, and in the morning work it well again, make it into rolls, put them in the oven to take a second rise, and when risen, bake them.--Mrs. Col. W.
Another Recipe for French Rolls. 3 pints of flour. 1 gill of yeast. 1 egg (beaten up). 1 tablespoonful of butter.
Mix up with milk and warm water and set to rise.--Mrs. Dr. E. Another Recipe for French Rolls or Twist. 1 quart of lukewarm milk. 1 teaspoonful of salt. 1 teacup of yeast. Enough flour to make a stiff batter.
When very light, add one beaten egg and two teaspoonfuls of butter, and knead in the flour till stiff enough to roll. Let it rise a second time, and, when very light, roll out, cut in strips and braid it. Bake thirty minutes, on buttered tins.--Mrs. S.
Five related yeast-dough formulas, all written for cooks who kept a jar of homemade liquid yeast and judged doneness by eye. The quantities are sound; the leavening and the oven need translating.
- The hinge: liquid yeast to dryA teacup, gill or tablespoonful of "yeast" here means homemade hop or potato yeast, a thin liquid of unpredictable strength. For any of these doughs, 2 1/4 teaspoons (one packet) of active dry or instant yeast is the working substitute, and the liquid the old yeast supplied must be added back as milk or water.
- Old measuresA gill is half a cup. A teacup in books of this period is usually reckoned at about 3/4 cup rather than a full 8 ounces. Two quarts of flour is roughly 8 cups, about 2 lb; four pints is the same thing said differently.
- Hydration is short as writtenTwo quarts of flour to one pint of water plus an egg gives a dough far too stiff to rise well. Expect to add liquid until you have a soft, tacky dough, which is what the writer would have arrived at by feel.
- The flour was softerVirginia households used soft winter wheat, lower in protein than modern bread flour. All-purpose works; a soft Southern flour gives the tender, close crumb these recipes were after.
- Oven temperaturesThe book gives none; as modern equivalents, loaves: 375F for 35 to 40 minutes, until the internal temperature is 195-200F. Rolls and the braided twist: 400F for 18 to 25 minutes -- the thirty minutes given for the twist is likely to overbake it at that heat.
- "Put them in the oven to take a second rise"Most likely the warm, closed, unlit oven used as a proofing box. In a modern kitchen, proof at 75-80F on the counter; do not put shaped rolls into a heated oven to rise.
- "Set before the fire"Simply a warm spot. Anything from 75 to 85F is right; above 90F the dough sours and slackens.
- Timing the dayMrs. S.'s eleven-in-the-morning start for five o'clock rolls reflects weak homemade yeast. With commercial yeast, the first rise takes 1 to 1 1/2 hours and the shaped rolls 45 minutes.
"Light bread" is the old Southern term for a wheat loaf raised with yeast, as distinct from the corn breads, batter breads and soda biscuits that were the everyday starch on a Virginia table. Calling it light was a real distinction: yeast had to be kept alive at home, usually in a jar of hop or potato ferment fed and topped up for weeks, and a household that could produce a risen wheat loaf on demand was signalling both good flour and a competent kitchen. That is why Housekeeping in Old Virginia (compiled by Marion Cabell Tyree, 1878) prints five versions in a row, each credited to a different contributor by initial only Mrs. Dr. S., Mrs. Col. W. the book being a collection of working household formulas gathered from friends rather than a single author's system. The mention of "hop yeast" and the instruction to set the bowl before the fire date the recipes squarely to the era before packaged yeast, when the leaven's strength was a variable the cook learned by watching rather than measuring.